hindu and christian theological parallels in the conversion of h. a. kṛṣṇa piḷḷai,...

American Academy of Religion

Hindu and Christian Theological Parallels in the Conversion of H. A. Kṛṣṇa Piḷḷai, 1857-1859Author(s): Dennis HudsonSource: Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 40, No. 2 (Jun., 1972), pp. 191-206Published by: Oxford University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1461018 .

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Hindu and Christian Theological Parallels in the Conversion of H. A. Krsna Pillai,

1857-1859

DENNIS HUDSON

ANY Christian students of the encounter between Hin- duism and Christianity have

tended in the past to focus on the radical distinctions between these religions, stressing the point that they are worlds apart in their understand- ings of history, incarnation, the after- life, the means of salvation and the divine nature. In my study of a Tamil poet of the nineteenth century Madras Presidency, H. A. Krsna Pillai (1827- 1900),1 a Hindu who left his devotion to NIrdyana (Visnu) and became a devotee of Jesus Christ, it has appeared to me that this stress on the differences

has often produced a distortion in the Christian's view of Hinduism. If any significant communication between ad- herents of these two religions is ever to take place, attention must be given to their similarities as well as to their differences.2

The study of a conversion, involving as it does the comparison of two religious traditions, can be useful in this regard, for it necessitates pinning down as exactly as possible the tradition to which the subject of study belonged prior to conversion, and the nature of the tradition to which he converted. Here I will focus on the theological as-

1The Life and Times of H. A. Krishna Pillai (1827-1900): A Study in the Encounter of Tamil Sri Vaishnava Hinduism and Evangelical Protestant Christianity in Nineteenth Century Tirunelvili District. (Ph.D. Thesis, Claremont Graduate School, 1970). This study was made possible by research in India, 1967-1969, funded by a Kent Fellowship of the Danforth Foundation and a Fulbright Student Fellowship. I would like to express my thanks here to Dr. John B. Carman, Center for the Study of World Religions, Harvard University, for his interest and encouragement in this study.

* Some Christian scholars are now giving this kind of serious attention to the subject and have produced several studies of particular relevance to the Hindu and Christian encounter in South India: Ninian Smart, The Yogi and the Devotee: The Interplay between the Upanishads and Catholic Theology (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1968); Mariasusai Dhavamony, Love of God According to Saiva Siddhdnta: A Study in the Mysti- cism and Theology of Saivism (Oxford at the Clarendon Press, 1971); and John B. Car- man, The Supremacy and Accessibility of God in the Theology of Ramanuja (New Haven: Yale University Press, forthcoming). Mention should also be made of Klaus Kloster- maier's record of his encounter with Vaisnavism in North India, In the Paradise of Krishna (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1971).

D. DENNIS HUDSON, A.B., A.M. (Oberlin College); Ph.D. (Claremont Graduate School); Assistant Professor of Religion at Smith College, specializing in the religious history of India. This article derives from his dissertation research as a Kent Fellow and Fulbright Fellow in Madras, India, 1967-69.

191



192 DENNIS HUDSON

pects of two traditions, one Hindu and the other Christian, which meet in the life of one man and I will suggest that the theological similarities between these two traditions facilitated his conversion from one to the other.

Krsna Pijai is a useful subject for study in the phenomenon of conversion. A high-caste Hindu, well educated in the Sri Vaisnava tradition, he converted to evangelical Protestant Christianity at the age of twenty-nine. But unlike many other converts in India, he did not adopt the western life-style of the missionaries. He never became literate in English and probably could not con- verse in it. All of his Christian life he remained strictly vegetarian, observed the rules of purity and pollution regarding the food and caste (jiti) rela- tions, and carefully preserved his status as a Vellila, the highest group of castes among the non-Brdhmans of Madras Presidency. To this day his descendents retain a strong sense of their identity as Velljla Protestants, an identity which distinguishes them not only from the Hindus, but also from low-caste Chris- tians on one hand and missionaries on the other.

Thus, there were important cultural continuities between his life as a Hindu and as a Christian-his cultural world remained Tamil, his religious thought in both traditions was in Tamil, his style of life remained that of the Vellilas-and they suggest that a similar continuity may have existed in his religious faith. This seems even more

likely when we observe that the kind of Hinduism from which he converted

(Tengalai Sri Vaisnavism) and the kind of Christianity he found persuasive (evangelical Protestantism of the Church of England) parallel each other remarkably in their mode of thought and devotion.

When I speak of a continuity in faith, however, I do not mean a continuity in the object of faith (at least on the conscious level), for Krsna Pillai unambiguously renounced Visnru when he became a Christian. The continuity I mean is in the form or struc- ture of his faith, the way he thought about himself in relation to God and the nature of his devotion and practical piety. This structural continuity did exist, I think, and can be summarized in the Sanskrit terms bhakti and sara-

.nzgati: both as a Hindu and as a

Christian Krsna Pillai understood devotion (bhakti) as the highest relation of man to God and refuge in the Lord of the Universe as the only means to salvation (Jarazgati).

Krsna Pitlai's chief claim to distinction as a Tamil poet is his major work, Iraksaniya Ydttirikam (The Pilgrimage of Salvation), a kivya or court epic of nearly 4,000 verses which adapts the story of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Pro- gress to the canons of classical Tamil poetry." An analysis of this work would reveal the many points at which Krsna Pillai resonates the Vaisnava bhakti of his past, particularly the hymns of the ilvdrs and the Tamil version of the

8 H. A. Krishna Pillai, Irakshapya Yattirikam (The Rakshanya Yathrikum: A Tamil Poetical Work Based on the Story of the Pilgrim's Progress of John Bunyan). First Edi- tion. (Madras: The Christian Literature Society, 1894). A second edition appeared in two volumes (1927 and 1931 respectively), and the first volume was published in a third edition in 1958.



HINDU AND CHRISTIAN THEOLOGICAL PARALLELS 193

Ramayana composed by Kambar. But such a study lies outside the scope of this paper. Here I would like to focus on the culminating event in his conversion, the time when he took refuge in the foot of Christ. My purpose will be to suggest ways in which the religious understanding he had as a Tamil- speaking Tengalai Sri Vaisnava influ- enced his acceptance of the Christian claim about Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

THE EARLY LIFE OF KRSNA PILLAI

Krsna PiUai was born in 1827 in a small village near the

Timrapar.nt River in Tirunelvali District in what was then known as the Presidency of Madras and now as Tamil Nadu. He had only one surviving sibling, a brother named Muttaiya Pillai, seven

years younger than himself. Krsna Pil- lai's father was an estate manager and a Tamil gentleman well educated in the traditional culture of their caste. Though classified by the Brihmanical law codes (dharma-!jstra) as Sfidras, the high-caste Velllas of Tirunelvali District were rivals of the Brihmans in intellectual and cultic leadership among the lower castes, and they were especially important in the development and exposition of Tamil (as opposed to Sanskrit) literature. Krsna Pillai's father was well versed in the Tamil version of the

Ramayana and recited it

daily as part of his ritual observances and devotions. He was an adherent of

the Tengalai or "Southern Language" division of the Sri Vaisnava tradition as distinct from the Vadagali or "North- ern Language" division, the former stressing the use of Tamil literature and the latter the use of Sanskrit literature. All available information about him makes it clear that he was a faithful observer of the daily duties of a high- caste Vaisnava householder. These duties assume the observance of purity and pollution distinctions in dietary and social matters and involve the performance of morning ablutions, the application of the ndmam or symbol of Visnu and Sri (Laksmi) on the fore- head to signify slavery to the Lord, and an act of worship to the household image of Visnu consisting of a recita- tion of mantras and scriptures. In addi- tion such an observant householder would attend temple rituals and parti- cipate in the periodic celebration of Vaisnava and Tamil Hindu festivals.4

As the eldest son, K.s.na Pillai received special attention in his education, for upon him would fall the responsibility of heading the household after his father's death and performing the annual 'rdddha rituals for his father and ancestors. He received his practical education through the school in his village where he learned to read and write Tamil and memorized traditional Tamil ethical works. At some point in his childhood he studied Sanskrit with a Brahman and learned it well enough to use Sanskrit terminology frequently in

' A detailed description of the duties incumbent upon a BrAhman Sri Vaisnava

is given by K. Rangachari, The Sri Vaishnava Brahmans. Bulletin of the Madras Government Museum. New Series-General Section, Vol. II, Pt. 2. (Madras: Government Press, 1931). The non-Brahman initiate is not expected to observe these patterns of behaviour as strictly as a Brihman, but piety is expressed by the degree to which he does observe them.



194 DENNIS HUDSON

his later poetry and prose, often to the

disadvantage of ordinary literate Tam- ilians.

Education in his Sri Vaisnava tradition was first given him by his father who instructed him in the performance of certain rituals and taught him the basic religious literature: the Tamil

Rdmdyanam and the hymns of devotion

and theology composed by the lvdrs (especially Nammilvdr) and the aciryas or teachers. This instruction from his father continued until his death in 1842, when Krsna PiUai was fifteen, by which time he was able to recite and expound portions of the Tamil Rdmayanam by himself. This education given by his father was translated into a religious commitment through another guru, a Tengalai Sri Vaisnava Brihman cirya from the temple of Sri Rangam. Through him Krsna Pillai received his formal initiation as a Sri Vaisnava, an initiation which made him a disciple of Riman- uja, and through Rdminuja a slave of Visnu who had revealed himself in

Nammilvir. This ceremony is central to the Sri Vaisnava tradition and I will focus on it here as a means of sum- marizing Tengalai Sri Vaisnava theology.5

Krsna Pillai was about thirteen at the time. The initiation ritual, the pani- casa~mskdra, consists of five sacramental acts each of which he probably performed as follows. First, he vowed to

submit to NIriyana (Visnu) and to keep all the daily rituals required by him, and then was branded by the cdirya on his shoulders with the em-

blems of Ndrtyania, the conch and the discus. Second, he received the ndmam of Visnu on twelve parts of his body, each mark made to the accompaniment of a mantra invoking one of the twelve forms (mirti) of Ndrdyana to protect him according to each mfirti's particular function. The third ritual, one in which he was to receive a name of

Ndrdyana as his own personal name, was passed over in his case, as he already possessed the name Krsna. The fourth ritual was an impartation by the cdirya of the Secrets (Rahasya), three

mantras which summarize and embody all knowledge (jtiana) revealed by God and which symbolize the

rir Vais- nava theology of attaining moksa. The fifth and final ritual was the most cru- cial, for this was the act of taking refuge (prapatti) in Ndriyana. Krsna Pil- lai prostrated himself before an image of Nirayana and the acdrya introduced him to Nirdyana as an initiated disciple of Rdmdnuja who has thrown himself at the feet of the Lord for protection (raksand, irattcippu, iraksaniya). By doing this he was expressing his re- liance upon Nirdyana as the only means (upiya) for attaining the goal (upeya) of moksa: that is, he was relying on God alone as the means for attaining God.

'The following description of the rituals is based on Rangachari, The Sri Vaishnava Brahmans, pp. 34-36; H. Daniel Smith, "Prapatti-The Sacrament of Surrender-Its Lit- urgical Dimensions" (Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, Boston, October 23, 1969), and discussions with Sri K. K. A.

Vengat.icri, a

Tengalai scholar in Triplicane, Madras. Sri VengaticAri has been of great assistance to me in clarifying many details about Sri Vaisnava thought and practice and I would like to express my thanks to him here.




From this point on, Kqsna Pi.ai

was a prapanna: one who has fled to the feet of God for refuge, relying on no effort of his own to attain moksa. From thenceforth, his faithful performance of his daily and periodical ritual duties was to be done for no other reason ex-

cept to please NirIyana by doing what he has commanded. Having once made the ritual act of prapatti, the rest of his life was to be spent cultivating the attitude of prapatti,6 an attitude char- acterized by a sense of such deep en-

tanglement in samsiira that no matter what he thinks or does he cannot escape from it on his own, and by a simultan- eous trust that because he has performed prapatti, Narayana will protect him in this life and take him to himself at the time of death.7

The trust in Niriyana's faithfulness in protecting those who take refuge in him is to be so deep that at no time of crisis will the prapanna again call out for refuge. The medieval icirya Battar portrayed this trust when he wrote, The character of a prapanna is like that of one who, while travelling at midnight on a lonely road through a jungle filled with fierce animals, where only one step at a time can be taken, stands still while it rains

and thunders, and while lightning splashes in his eyes like fire, yet in that great difficulty does not take refuge in the Holy Name.8

The Tengalai prapanna is to understand himself as having made no effort to reach moksa by his own power, other than mentally acquiescing to the grace of God (arul, dayd) who has taken the initiative in bestowing protection (rak-

.san~) on the soul. His act of uttering

the mantras in the paficasamsklra cere-

mony was itself the result of Nirdyana's prompting, for it was only by Ndrdy- ana's mercy that he was brought to the awareness of his helpless and frightful condition, and to the awareness of

Nirayana himself as the means of release from it through the way of taking refuge (jaravagati). This knowledge came to him through Nir~yana's own self-revelation in the Vedas and in Namm.lvir and through his own partial descent (an•Jvatdra) in the citryas, especially in Riminuja.9

THE CULMINATING CONVERSION EXPERIENCE

Between the time of Krsna Pillai's

performance of the paficasapmsk~ra in about 1839 and his own experience of

" This distinction between prapatti as ritual and prapatti as attitude is made by H. Daniel Smith, "Prapatti," pp. 1-2.

"This attitude is made explicit in Ndriyana's response to Riminuja's act of prapatti in the Gadya Traya, a collection of three Sanskrit hymns attributed by tradition to Rimi- nuja and important as models of prapatti for his disciples. They are translated into English by M. R. Rajagopala Ayyangar, The Gadya-Traya of Sri Ramanujacharya (Madras, n.d.) and discussed by John B. Carman in The Supremacy and Accessibility of God in the Theol- ogy of Ramanuja (Mss of 1970 to be published by Yale University Press), pp. 257-62.

'Entry 417 of Battar, Virtitm•lai (Saraswati Vandiram, 1887), p. 172, given to me by Sri K.K.A. VegaticIri. The translation from the Tamil is mine.

'Sri Vaisnava tradition follows what it calls the "Vedinta of both kinds" (ubhaya vedanta), recognizing the summation of revealed knowledge (Sruti) in both the Sanskrit tradition which culminates in the Upanisads and in the Tamil tradition which began with the ilvir NammilvAr and passes through the teaching of iciryas of whom Riminuja is the greatest. This abhaya vedinta assumes that the Sanskrit and the Tamil revelations are the same revelation and are of equal value as authorities.



196 DENNIS HUDSON

conversion to the Christian view of God about sixteen years later, many developments took place in his life which cannot be discussed here. Chief among them, however, were first, his participation in an attack on low-caste Christian converts at the age of eigh- teen; second, his later employment as a Tamil teacher in a seminary run by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel where he gradually became convinced of Genesis 1 through Exo- dus 20 as a true account of creation, the coming of sin and the deluge, but not of the Christian Gospel as taught by the missionaries; third, the gradual build-up of tension within himself resulting from his obligation as a prapanna to perform the daily ritual worship of an image of Niriyana on one hand, and his own acceptance of the validity of Genesis 1 through Exodus 20 which condemned such image worship on the other; and fourth, the conversion to Christianity of his younger brother and a close mutual friend in March, 1857. This last development exacerbated the tension and indecisive- ness in his own mind, creating a crisis which finally resulted in his own personal experience of the Christian Gos-

pel as true. I will focus on this conversion experience as he recalled it in the account of his conversion he wrote in Tamil in 1893.10

After his brother and their mutual friend, Dhanuskoti Riju, had made open profession of their conversion (an interesting story in its own right), Krsna Pillai visited them frequently and talked with them about their change of faith. Seeking to persuade him to convert, Dhanuskoti Riju urged Krsna Pillai to read four Pietist works in Tamil translation (discussed below) in order for him to understand what he was refusing to accept.

Kr.sna Pillai did

this. Then Dhanuskoti Riju suggest- ed that he read the Gospel straight through, with prayer, begging God in- tensely to open the eyes of his heart. Krsna Pillai did this also, reading in the New Testament for the first time.1" But the result of this direct reading of the New Testament was mixed. As he later recalled,

While I clearly understood doctrines such as the Savior's sacred incarnation, I was greatly perplexed and bewildered, not comprehending how his act of expiation imparts salvation to men.'

None of the categories of thought were

" A Tamil manuscript entitled "H. A. Kirusna Pillai Kirustavanina Varal.ru,"

which I have translated and annotated as "The Conversion Account of H. A. Krishna Pillai," Indian Church History Review (Madras), 2/1 (1968), 15-43. The fact that this auto- biographical account was written about thirty-five years after his conversion limits its relia- bility, but in my thesis I have made an effort to place the events he portrays in their historical context and have found no reason to seriously doubt the accuracy of his memory.

SKrsna Pillai probably read the Tamil translation of the New Testament made by the Pietist German missionary C.T.E. Rhenius earlier in the nineteenth century. This translation and the 1796 revision of the Old Testament translation made by Philipp Fabricius were especially favored by the Church of England missions in TirunelvEli District. Both were reprinted in 1857 in a single volume Jubilee Edition. See D. Rajarigam, The History of Tamil Christian Literature (Madras: Christian Literature Society, 1958), p. 43.

"1This and the following quotations describing his conversion are from my translation of his conversion account, Indian Church History Review, (Madras), 2/1 (1968), pp. 15-43.




strange to him - avatdra (descent or incarnation), prdyascitta (expiation), raksandz (protection or salvation) - the problem for him was to understand how they fit together.

What the Gospel required was a commentary, for merely reading it was not self-revelatory to him. This commentary was provided by Dhanuskoti Riju one night when they were alone in Krsna Pillai's house in

P.laiyan- k6ttai. It is significant that the necessary interpretive framework for the new religious perception was not provided by a missionary, but by Dhanus- koti Riju, a close friend and a recent convert who came out of a similar Sri

Vaisnava background. The scene, as the poet recalled it

thirty-six years later, went as follows. Krsna Pillai expressed all his doubts and perplexities regarding Christian doctrine and asked his friend about them. Dhanuskoti Riju then explained the Christian myth of the incarnation and atoning crucifixion in the following way:

In order to mediate between the Holy God and man the sinner, who was confined in the dark prison of sin and deserved due punishment for having disobeyed the divine statutes, and in order to harmonize justice and mercy, the Lord Christ, the son of God, stood surety and descended as a man. He obeyed the statutes completely as one pure in the three constituents [mind, speech and body]; taking upon himself both the spot- less justice and all the sins of mankind, he himself received all the punishment which was coming to man because of divine justice, and was crucified, with grief to his soul and agony flooding his body.

The way in which Christ's death is mediated to the individual as a saving power he explained this way:

... .whosoever believes as one pure in the three constituents, that having made a sacrifice for the expiation of sin and a volun- tary sacrifice of life Christ acquired a faultless act of merit; and believes that having risen alive as a victorious hero on the third day after dying he acquired the salvation of eternal life for crores of souls; and believes that having risen to heaven, he sat in state on the mercy seat at the right side of the Father, and graciously bestows salvation on the believers; and believes that because of the fact that he is the All-Indwelling Being the salvation which he obtained is quite suitable to be inherited by all men; and whosoever says with the experience of sin and genuine true repentance, "Christ alone is the destroyer of sin, the world saviour, who has stood surety for me and has taken upon himself and has satisfied the punishment which must be mine, and saves me by the power of his act of merit," that man is made righteous by this very belief. The power of Christ's act of merit is infused into him and is salvation for him. He alone is a jivan mutka.

Krsna Pillai found Dhanuskoti REju's explanation convincing.

On that very day [he wrote] the Holy Spirit implanted this truth in my heart. On that very day I knew Christ the Lord. On that very day I invoked his holy name and prayed. On that very day the crimes of sin which had been sweet became disgusting. On that very day I wrote this verse in celebration: "O Sea of Grace, O Sun that dispels the works of Darkness, O God who has released precious life for this your slave. On this occasion when you make a devotee of me, a low wicked fellow not knowing the meaning of Truth, I offer my heart to only you, the form of Dharma." God opened my heart, [he concludes] and I opened my mouth to praise him.

Krsna Pillai's verse of praise, it is interesting to note, in no way indicates the name of the Lord in whom he has taken refuge; and the final epithet, Dharma-mizrti ("The Form of Dhar-



198 DENNIS HUDSON

ma"), recalls to mind the figure of Rima, who embodied dharma on earth and to whom he had been devoted as a Hindu. This, his first poetic compo- sition as a Christian, could well have been uttered by a Vaisnava. But from this time on, Krsia Pillai considered himself a Christian, chosen by Christ to be his bhakta. Now he had to face the problem of making this internal conversion consistent with his public life. The major questions for him lay in what to do about his daily 8ri Vais- tnava rituals, "the very crimes of sin which had been sweet," and about his family. But the way he handled these problems remains another story.

INTELLECTUAL ELEMENTS IN THE CONVERSION EXPERIENCE

In order to analyze the intellectual elements in this conversion experience, and to indicate the areas where I think Krsna Piflai's own Tengalai Srr Vais-

nava background and his new position as a Christian of the evangelical persuasion converge and diverge, I will first discuss the Pietist works which Krsna Pillai read at this time, and then examine Dhanuskoti Riju's convincing explication of the Christian myth of salvation, or, stated more precisely, the way Krsnia Pillai remembered the explication after having been a Christian for thirty-six years.

Of the four books Krsna Pillai read in Tamil translation, two can be iden- tified for certain. One is J. G. Pike's Persuasives to Early Piety, translated as Ilamai Bakti.13 The other is John Bun- yan's Pilgrim's Progress, a work which illustrates the kind of Pietist theology expounded by Pike.14 A third work was "Heart Watchfulness," a four page tract translated as Irudaya Kaval, of un- known authorship and not now available. In the following discussion I will confine my remarks to the work by Pike, supplemented by reference to another book of its kind, which may be identical with the fourth book he read, entitled Attumavicdrantirttal, but that identification is not certain. It is J. A. James's The Anxious Inquirer After Salvation,15 a book Krsna Pilai's brother and his friend Dhanuskoti Rija had read in English prior to their own conversions.

The books by Pike and James are evangelical instruments aimed at per- suading the reader to change his ways and become a "true" Christian. This is especially true of Pike's Persuasives to Early Piety, which calls the reader to attend to important things,

... for of how little consequence is this poor transient world to you, who have an eternal world to mind! - It is not to a trifle that I call your attention, but to your life, your all, your eternal all, your God,

" J. G. Pike, Persuasives to Early Piety. Interspersed with Suitable Prayers. A New Edition (New York: Reprinted for the American Tract Society, 1830), 359 pp. I have not been able to locate the Tamil translation of this work and therefore cannot determine to what degree the translation itself contributed to Krsna

Pil.ai's persuasion by using

characteristically Vaisnava terminology. " The first part of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress had been translated into Tamil since

1793 and the entire work since 1853. ' John Angell James, The Anxious Inquirer After Salvation (New York: American

Tract Society, n.d.), 212 pp.




your Saviour, your heaven, your everything that is worth a thought or a wish."'

The issue at stake is eternity, whether it is to be spent in heaven or in hell: In one hundred years, Pike observes, you will be gone from this world for ever, body dust, name forgotten, "yet your immortal soul will be living in another world, and far more sensible of joy or grief than it can possibly be now."17

Reading this work through the eyes of a Tengalai Srr Vaisnava, as Krsina Piflai was, one is struck by the degree to which the two theologies parallel each other. The human soul is eternal, and though belonging to God, its source, it is trapped by the corruption of the mind and the body. As Pike explains, the word of God, . . . teaches you that you are corrupt and polluted, and at variance with your God; having all the powers of your soul dis- ordered; and exposed, justly exposed, to everlasting ruin; and so entirely depraved and undone, that without a change as great as a second birth, you cannot possibly see the kingdom of God."

This passage, as well as its conclusion, would seem quite familiar to a prapanna, for it was precisely because of his thorough corruption and inability to do any right thing to merit moksa that he became a slave to Visnu through the ritual of the paficasam- sk~ra.

Both traditions have a similar sense of the urgent need to be saved from the bondage of the "carnal mind" which is at enmity with God. Both agree, as Pike says, that "the multitude are travelling the downward road; and but few find the path that leads to glory and to God."19 And both feel that the need is urgent: Pike speaks of the eternity that awaits one after death, and the Sri Vaisnava fears the hell (naraka) that awaits him because of his sin, the continual and wearisome existence in samsdra, and the threat of the coming dissolution.20 Both agree that the core of the problem is the sin of not loving God totally, for the soul is entangled in its love for the body and the world, forgetting him who loves it most dearly. But before release from this condition can occur, both theologies teach, the individual must know that such is his condition. Pike states that the foundation of "religion" is laid in a knowledge of our own guilt and depravity which leads us to "an anxious desire for deliverance from its power and punishment."21 Similarly, before a person can take refuge in Ndrdyana, he must first realize his condition of enmity with God, as did Vib- hisana, the demon brother of Rivana who, in the Tamil Rdmayanam, serves as a paradigm of the refugee who flees to the feet of RIma and is promised

" Pike, Early Piety, p. 7. 1 Ibid., p. 9. , Pike, Early Piety, p. 22. 1Pike, Early Piety, p. 38. ~ See Tondaradipp6di Alvir, "Tirumdlai," verses 3, 6, and 9, translated in K. C.

Varadachari, Alvars of South India (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1966), pp. 86-89. Sri K. K. A.

Vengat.cri noted that illustrated books describing the hells awaiting the

sinner were common in his Sri Vaisnava household as he grew up. ' Pike, Early Piety, p. 71.



200 DENNIS HUDSON

protection.22 In both traditions this

knowledge of need is itself the result of divine grace.

We have observed earlier that the central teaching of the Tengalai Sri

Vaisnava tradition regarding salvation is that the only means of protection (raksand) for the soul is God himself. The prapanna is one who relies on no other means than God. This is exactly the position given by Pike:

Your whole trust will be in him [Jesus Christ]: abhorring yourself, you will fall to him as your sole dependence .... Nothing past, nothing present, nothing future of your own must in the slightest degree, be the ground of your dependence; but, as stripped of everything, as in yourself desti- tute of all good, you must look to the Lamb of God.'

Pike gives the parable of the Prodigal Son an interpretation that neatly illustrates the Srt Vaisnava concept of the prapanna:

No sooner did he [the prodigal] sincerely repent and apply for mercy, than he found it. His father welcomed him to his bosom; and received him as his son again. Yet, observe, he had done nothing to deserve his favour. ... Such is the grace displayed to you in the gospel. It is free; it is as full.2'

But the parallel to the prapanna does not stop there, for Pike goes on to make a comment which also sums up

the Tengalai Sri Vaisntava teaching about how one performs his ritual duties after he has performed prapatti:

The prodigal, thus freely pardoned, was ad- mitted again as a son into his father's family. What would be his conduct there? Surely every motive of gratitude and love, would urge him to obey his father's will: but, the motive would not be, that he might find mercy, for he had found it; it would not be, to gain admission into his father's house, for he had gained it: far nobler motives, the motives of love, would influ- ence his conduct. . . . The true Christian serves God, not to gain admission into his Father's family; for, when he came to Christ he gained this blessing: but, he renders to him the obedience of a child, thankful for a thousand favours."

Krsna Pillai probably found other familiar Sri Vaisnava forms of thought when reading these books. The Holy Spirit, who urges the individual from within towards God and who illumi- nates his condition, is analogous to the antaryamin, that form of NTrIyana which stays with the soul in all its embodied forms and is a friend to it.26 God himself, Pike says, is the teacher of the way of salvation. "For this very end he came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book."27 In Tamil the Christians called this book the Veda, the same word used by Hindus for Sruti, the revelation which has been heard. The core of the Christian Veda,

' It is because of this scene that Kambar's Radmyanam is known among Tamilians as the "Saranigati fistra (the text on taking refuge in God as the means for attaining moksa). See T. P. Meenakshisundaram, "Sarandgati (A History of the Conception in Tamil Liter- ature), "Munshi Indological Felicitation Volume (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1963).

'Pike, Early Piety, p. 76. 2 Ibid., p. 88. 2 Ibid., p. 89. ' Srinivisadisa, Yatindramatadipikd. Translated from the Sanskrit by Svimi Adide-

vinanda. Second Edition. (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math, 1967), IX, 26. v Pike, Early Piety, p. 122.




the Gospel, is analogous to the Rahas- ya, the Secrets of taking refuge in Niriyana through the Goddess Sri, Secrets which Riminuja had made available to all devotees of Visnu. Both Rahasya and Gospel are passed down in an institutionalized succession of teachers, a line which is understood to begin with God's own descent as a man.

When Protestant theology spoke of the mediating role of Christ, the com- passionate one in heaven who inter- cedes on behalf of the soul before the righteous God, Krsna Pillai may have found this very like the position of the Goddess Srt in Tengalai Sri Vaisnava theology. As stated in the Dvaya Man- tra which he had repeated daily in his ritual observances, it is through her that divine wrath is propitiated and cooled.28 When Protestant theology spoke of the human teaching role of Christ, the savior who both teaches the saving knowledge and is the means to salvation, he may have been reminded of a similar aspect of Tengalai Sri Vais- nava theology. According to M. R. Rajagopala Ayyangar, it is possible for a Tengalai icdrya (who traces his own initiatory lineage back to Riminuja)

to be a "savior" for a disciple who may do nothing more than devoutly serve him, the icIrya. The act of prapatti is not even necessary. By winning the goodwill and love of the ic~rya through this devout service, the icirya can secure moksa for him on the basis of his own realization of sacred knowledge (jfAna).29 In his later poetry, Krsna Pillai often referred to Jesus as a guru; in his own conversion he may have found the evangelical Protestant stress on devotion to the loving savior Jesus rather familiar, for both Jesus and the Tengalai icdrya not only teach the saving knowledge, but are the means to salvation.

In the Sri Vaisnava case the greatest dckrya is R~imnuja whose own act of prapatti provides the model for all who are his disciples.30 The formal parallels between Jesus and Riminuja may have made the evangelical Protestant teaching sound familiar to Krsna Pillai: both are savior-teachers of the past to whom one can be bound as a disciple today through the proper initiation rituals (baptism, paficasamskira), both revealed a saving knowledge (Gospel, Rahasya), and both performed saving acts (crucifixion, prapatti) which their

a The Dvaya Mantra consists of two (dvaya) Sanskrit mantras which link NirryaQa with his consort Sri or Laksmi: S~nman nrdyapna charanau aranam prapadye (I take refuge in the feet of Nirlyana who has Sri as his consort), and

Sr•mate ndrjyandya namah (I do reverance to Niriyana who has Sri). Both parts of this double mantra are understood to mean that the speaker possesses nothing, not even his own soul, and relies entirely on the grace of God for moksa. They also state that Nra-yana cannot be approached without first going through his consort Sri, which is actualized when one pronounces the mantra beginning with the word "Sri." The meaning of this Dvaya Mantra and the other two mantras imparted at the time of the paficasamskira is expounded by Vedinta De'ika, Srfmad Rahasyatrayasara, trans. and ed. by M. R. Rajagopala Ayyangar (Kumbakonam: Agnihothram Ramanuja Thatachariar, 1956). See especially chapters I-III, pp. 11-31. a Delika, Srimad Rahasyatrayasara, p. xxxv. " This role of Riminuja as model for prapatti is exemplified in the Gadya Traya and was first brought to my attention by Sri K. K. A. Vengaticiri.



202 DENNIS HUDSON

Pietist and Tengalai disciples respectively seek to "imitate." Crucifixion and prapatti, however, are only for- mally analogous and as will be noted shortly, the former was a major problem for Krsna Pillai's understanding.

But his difficulty in understanding the crucifixion did not seem to lie with the emphasis on the suffering and death of the savior in evangelical Prot- estant doctrine. This emphasis may not have seemed as alien to him as we might think. It is true that none of the avatdrs in SrT Vaisnava tradition died as part of their saving act, but that fact does not mean that they were not prepared to do so if necessary. It should be noted that in the scene in the Rdmdyanzam where Rima advises giving refuge to Vibhisana, the brother of his arch-enemy RIvana, Rima states that he is willing to die for the sake of those who take refuge in him, and invokes several examples of heroes in the past who had sacrificed themselves for others, such as King Sibi.81 In the eyes of the prapanna Krsna Pillai, Jesus may have appeared as the single avatar who fulfilled this ideal completely, rising, as Dhanuskoti Riju stated, "as a victorious hero" three days after his death.

This much of what he read in these works would not have been unfamiliar to him and he noted in his conversion account that upon reading the Gospels

he clearly understood "doctrines such as the Saviour's sacred incarnation (tiru

avatdram)." The point at which he had difficulty was the question of how Jesus' crucifixion serves to save: "I was greatly perplexed and bewildered," he recalled, "not comprehending how his act of expiation imparts salvation to men."32 This, it appears, was the central point at which his mind had to change radically, for the atoning crucifixion of the savior has no parallels in Sri Vaisnava theology. It is in understanding this central doctrine that Dhanuskoti Rdju's explanation was cru- cial.

The problem in understanding this doctrine can be expressed in two questions: why was this form of atonement necessary, and how does it work to save or protect? The first question was a stumbling block not only to Krsna Pillai, but also to his brother and to other Tamil converts,88 for it involves the unfamiliar problem of reconciling or balancing the justice (nmti) and mercy (irakkam) of God (nitiyirakka samarasam). In the Srt Vaisnava tradition, God is the master of justice (nitivdn) and the possession of mercy is one of his characteristics. He admin- isters justice through the relentless law of karma, and it is this fact which causes the Tengalai 8rt Vaisnava dis- tress, for he believes himself unable to do anything that will not further en-

' The scene as portrayed by the tenth century Tamil poet Kambar occurs in "Yuddha- kintdam," IV, 107-120. I have used the edition and commentary of V. M. Gopilakrsna- macariyar, Sri Kambardamyanam, 7 vols. (Madras, 1962), VI, p. 174.

82 "avaradaiya pirdyaccittam mapitanukka evvdru iraksippai uandkkukiratu." "For an example of this problem among other educated Tamil converts see A. S.

Appasamy, Fifty Years Pilgrimage of a Convert (Madras: The Christian Literature Society for India, 1940), pp. 18, 164.




tangle him in the retributive justice of karma which keeps him bound to samp- sara.

At the same time God's quality of mercy (irakkam, daya) is his hope, and, he trusts, through the mediation of Sri, Nirdyana will grant him refuge and at the time of his death will break through his own application of justice and set his soul free from the punishment which is its due. All God re- quires on the part of the individual is the act of taking refuge (and some- times not even that), in order for his mercy to go into effect. This is wit- nessed to in Rdma's acceptance of

VibhTsana, in Visnu's rescue of the elephant Gajendra, and in other saving events. The Vadagalai division of the Sri Vaisnava tradition maintains that such grace cannot be given without some cause, for that would invalidate the requirements of justice, but the Tengalai tradition maintains that God can bestow grace on anyone at any time, even upon those who resist him.34 In both cases, however, the greater emphasis is placed on God as merciful: the relentlessness of karma is assumed and constitutes the problem of man; the solution to the problem is God's gracious action which will cut through it and release man from his prison.35

The evangelical Protestant teaching comes quite close to this, for man's problem is that although he may not realize it, he breaks God's command- ments and thereby rightly deserves

God's enactment of just punishment. The only just punishment, however, is eternal existence in hell. As with the Sri Vaisnava tradition, God is both just and merciful, but unlike the Sri Vais- navas, the Protestants did not stress God's mercy at the expense of his justice. The purpose of God, says James in The Anxious Inquirer, is to appear what he is, "a holy God in hating sin, a righteous God in punishing it, and a merciful God at the same time in for- giving it."36 The individual must somehow be righteous before God in order to attain heaven, an expectation the Sri Vaisnavas would never have. Where the soul in evangelical Prot- estant thought must stand before the King clothed in righteousness, in Sri Vaisnava thought it is clothed in nothing at all, but stands before the King in its essential purity, having dispensed with all of its righteousness and un- righteousness at the time of death.

Following the "Satisfaction Theory" of atonement, the missionaries said that in order for the soul to become righteous, only one who is perfectly righteous and of infinite value can offer the kind of atonement which will satisfy God's justice and suffice as the atonement for all men's sins. God himself is the only one who qualifies as both perfectly righteous and of infinite value, and thus he himself must provide the atoning sacrifice. This he did by sending his son, who is also himself. As a result, all one has to do to become

"See John B. Carman, "Ramanuja's Conception of Divine Supremacy and Accessi- bility" Anviksiki (Benaras), Vol. I, Nos. 1 and 2 (Aug., Dec., 1968), p. 121. " See the discussion of the problem of justice and mercy in the thought of Ramdnuja and in later Sri Vaisnava theology in Carman, The Supremacy and Accessibility of God, pp. 274-87, 355-61.

" James, The Anxious Inquirer, p. 59.



204 DENNIS HUDSON

righteous before God is to trust the death of Jesus as atoning. By this trust one becomes the "property of God" and gains holiness.37

The key, then, is fleeing to the feet of the crucified Christ "as your sole dependence." In Sri Vaisnava terms this is the way of taking refuge (jaranz- agati), the act of prapatti, which in evangelical Protestant terms is expressed as "having faith" or "trust" or "belief." The crucified one is trusted as one who has performed an expiatory sacrifice (prayaicitta), and by taking refuge in this person one attains salvation or protection (raksand). But how does the crucifixion work to provide raksani to the soul of the refugee? Pike gives little attention to this question, but James, following the "Satis- faction Theory" of atonement, presents it in juridical terms: The righteousness of Christ is imparted to the sinner and God accepts him out of regard for what Christ did and suffered for his sake.

This judicial act of God in justifying the sinner takes place when, and as soon as he believes in Christ, because by that act of faith he is brought into union with the Saviour, and becomes legally one with him, so as to receive the benefit of his mediato- rial undertaking.38

It does not appear that this juridical mode of thought was convincing to Krsna Pillai, and it may actually have been an obstacle to his understanding. Danuskoti Riju included this juridical notion in his persuasive statement of Christian doctrine, but modified it with a stress on the role of merit

(puznya, pulniyam) rather than law as the connection between Christ and the believer. By "having made a sacrifice for the expiation of sin and a vol-

untary sacrifice of [his own] life Christ

acquired a faultless act of merit (pun-

.ziyam)." The implication is that in so

doing, Christ built up a great store of merit which he can bestow on others, in a way analogous to the Sri Vaisnava who, at the time of his death, is to bestow his faults and merits on others. When one truly believes Christ is his savior, Dhanuskoti Rdju explained, that belief (visuvrsam) itself has made him righteous (nitimsanskki), and the

power from Christ's act of merit is infused into him and is his protection or salvation (iragttcippu). Christ's own merit is the devotee's protection before the divine Judge and not a legal rela-

tionship. Christ as a person of great merit is

certainly a part of Protestant thought, but I would suggest that this particular formulation of the role of the power of Christ's merit resonates of the Indian

religious milieu where merit and its

power has played an important role for centuries. In Indian religious thought, all acts bear fruit, and good acts bear merit, so much so that men who are unusual in their meritorious acts can build up enough meritorious power to

compel boons from the gods (deva). In the Mahy~ina Buddhist tradition, the Bodhisattva is understood as a savior who saves precisely in this man- ner, by bestowing merit on those who take refuge in him, thus allowing them to be reborn in higher realms

3 Pike, Early Piety, p. 78. 8 James, The Anxious Inquirer, p. 69.




closer to Nirvana. Did this Bodhisattva idea become part of Sri Vaisnava theol-

ogy? Was Rimanuja ever understood by Srf Vaisnavas as an dcirya who built up a store of merit throuh his jfiina, bhakti and meritorious life which can be drawn upon by his subsequent disciples for their attainment of moksa? There is some evidence that he was.39

It seems clear that Dhanuskoti Rdju did draw on Sri Vaisnava theology for his explanation of how the atonement works for salvation when he used the concept of the antaryamin. It is because God is the All-Indwelling Being (sarvuantariyc~mi-p poruklyiruppatindl) that all men can share in the protection (ira.tcippu) and merit (punniyam) which Christ's act of expiation (pirdyaccittam) has earned. Upon belief, the power from Christ's merit instantly makes men righteous, and this is so because God already dwells with the soul and is a friend to it.

In sum, the solution to the problem of how Jesus' act of expiation imparts salvation to men seems to rest upon Dhanuskoti Rdju's use of two familiar concepts: first, the good act of a per- fect man builds up infinite merit, the power of which can be dispensed to

those who take refuge in him, and second, an element of God indwells all beings and through him this power is transmitted by which the refugee is made righteous.

It was the exposition of the Chris- tian myth of salvation by Dhanuskoti Rdju that led Krsna Pillai to experience it as true for himself. All the elements of thought fell together into a coherent pattern, a pattern which he experienced as truth. This experience of truth led him to an emotional commitment to Jesus Christ as his personal savior, a divine being whom he now perceived as his refuge and whose feet he figuratively took upon his head. The

anxiety about image worship which he had endured since reading Genesis 1 through Exodus 20 was now ended, and he felt himself clear as to what constitutes sin and what constitutes salvation. As a Hindu, the bonds which

kept him in the prison of sin (papam) he had understood to derive from the impurity of his mind, speech and body, an impurity resulting from his inherent condition of metaphysical ignorance (avidyz) which he was powerless to break through. As a Christian, the bonds which kept him in the prison of

SDr. K. R. Sundarardjan, a Vadagalai Sri Vaisnava, and a Lecturer in Hinduism at Punjabi University, Patiala, recalled in a recent conversion at the Center for the Study of World Religions, Harvard University, a Tengalai poem in which Rdmdnuja is likened to a lion which jumps from mountain to mountain and his disciples are likened to the leeches and other insects carried along with him as he jumps. Dr. Sundararajan also points out that the theme of merit and its distribution is pervasive in Sri Vaisnava thought. For example, one should be a friend rather than an enemy to a wise man, for at the time of a wise man's death the merits from the good acts of his life will be bestowed on his friends, while the sins from his bad acts will be bestowed on his enemies. The question needs to be investigated as to whether Rimdnuja's greatness as an dcdrya and prapana is understood to have built up a great store of merit which is dispensed to his "friends" when they become his disciples. Adding to this the teaching that Rdmdnuja is a partial avatar (apnidva- tdra) of God, one would come very close to Dhanuskoti Riju's explication of how Jesus and the crucifixion bestow salvation.



206 DENNIS HUDSON

sin (pipam) he also understood to derive from the impurity of his mind, speech and body, but an impurity now understood as resulting from his inherent rebellion against God and the

consequent violation of the Ten Com- mandments, expressed particularly in

image worship. What had once been sweet to him, the daily ritual service of Narayana before the image in which he was present (arcavatdra) was now

disgusting. In his conversion, his formal under-

standing of the power of sin (papam) and of his bondage to it may not have

changed, but his understanding of its nature did. This was also true in regard to the means by which to become free of this bondage. As a Hindu, the means had been divine grace (arul), which pierced the ignorance of his

mind (manas) and led him to take

refuge in Ni•ryana, becoming his slave. Now, as a Christian, it was divine grace (arul) which pierced the ignorance of his mind (manas) and led him to take

refuge in Christ, becoming his slave. What had once been light was now darkness and what was once seen as dharma was now a-dharma. The conversion had been made, a new path (marga) with a new content was now looked to for the attainment of moksa, and moksa itself was newly understood. But significantly, the nature of the means to moksa which the new path taught was the same as the means taught by the old path, saranigati. Whether as a Tengalai Sri Vaisnava or as an evangelical Protestant Christian, Krsna Pifai relied on God alone as the means for attaining God.



hindu and christian theological parallels in the conversion of h. a. kṛṣṇa piḷḷai,...

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